Victim, son take stand in Olde Pink House standoff case

Earl Hamilton Jr.

SAVANNAH, GA (WTOC) -

We may have watched the standoff unfold in real time on live TV, but what really happened at the Olde Pink House back in May?

Earl Hamilton Jr. says he was kidnapped, that Kevin Brooks forced him -- at gunpoint -- to drive downtown to his credit union and withdraw cash. But defense attorneys say that wasn't the case at all. They say Hamilton was a drug dealer. And that he went downtown to get cocaine, that the drugs were intended to re-pay Brooks for a gambling debt.

Hamilton was indignant.

"I'm tired of y'all making it seem like I'm the criminal when somebody come home invading me," he said.

Prosecutors say Brooks and his co-defendant, Brian Jones, ambushed Hamilton the night before at his home on Milton Street. But it all came to a head on Broughton Street, when Hamilton flagged down Detective Trina Mayes, who'd stopped at Starbucks for tea. Mayes took the stand Thursday. She said Brooks was armed and that she was afraid for her life.

"I drew my weapon and fired," she said. "He was trying to get in the driver's seat. He had a gun in his hands."

Hamilton's 13-year-old son, Earl David Hamilton, also testified. He described waking up to an armed man in his bedroom. He said he prayed.

"If I did end up dying, I wouldn't blame anyone or God because that's what God planned for me."

Prosecutors say the armed man in the bedroom was Jones, and that he came at the boy with a gun.

But the boy testified that, over the course of that long night, he befriended his attacker. Jones had gone to the same school the younger Hamilton was attending.

"He told me he wanted to go to college and get an education, but his friend had got him mixed up in the wrong stuff… I told him that must not be a really good friend."

Emergency crews are responding to a fire at a Walterboro gas station Wednesday night. (Source: Wendy Bryant)

Emergency crews are responding to a fire at a Walterboro gas station Wednesday night. (Source: Wendy Bryant)

Emergency crews are responding to a fire at a Walterboro gas station Wednesday night. It's at the Murphy USA gas station on 2100 Bells Highway near the Walmart. Copyright 2018 WCSC. All rights reserved.

Emergency crews are responding to a fire at a Walterboro gas station Wednesday night. It's at the Murphy USA gas station on 2100 Bells Highway near the Walmart. Copyright 2018 WCSC. All rights reserved.